Dig in to the '50s.Byline: Paul Denison The Register-Guard To get a handle on this summer's Oregon Festival of American Music Oregon Festival of American Music is an eclectic, thematically-based two-week summer music festival that has been held annually in Eugene, Oregon since 1992. Produced by The John G. , which runs for 11 days and includes 38 events, it might help to think of it as a pie baked by executive director James Ralph, jazz adviser Dick Hyman and James Paul, conductor and music director of OFAM's American Symphonia. They have taken "The Fabulous Fifties" decade and cut it up into several slices of American culture, each with its own distinctive texture and flavor. The first and biggest slice is musical theater, which includes four Hult Center performances of Lerner & Loewe's "My Fair Lady," with full orchestra, and two concerts devoted to popular songs from stage and movie musicals: "Comin' Up Roses" on Aug. 12 and "I Remember It Well" on Aug. 13. "My Fair Lady" is based on a play by George Bernard Shaw and is set in England. Once it was selected as the centerpiece of this summer's festival, Hyman and Paul thought at first that a British theme might be in order. ``But `My Fair Lady' is about as British as I am Bulgarian,'' Ralph says. "The text, of course, is pure Shaw (British, certainly), the lyrics are pure Lerner (therefore New York, and decidedly that) and the music is pure Loewe (very continental, Viennese to be exact, and certainly not British). "So I steered OFAM OFAM Oregon Festival of American Music 2004 toward more of a `slice of American culture' theme," Ralph says. The next biggest slices would be pop music and jazz. Thursday night's opening gala concert is roughly divided between the two, with a little folk and musical theater in the mix. Pop standards will be featured in an ``Instrumental Gold'' concert on Friday and a "Purple People Eater" program of "silly" songs on Aug. 11. They also will be heard during "At the Hop," a dinner-concert-dance at the Erb Memorial Union ballroom on Aug. 10, and in the festival finale featuring the Legends of Doo Wop at the Cuthbert Amphitheater on Aug. 14. The biggest jazz event will be the Dave Brubeck Quartet on Saturday, but jazz will be a pervasive presence throughout the festival. On Saturday, a jazz ensemble will demonstrate how "My Fair Lady Swings," and a jazz combo will back comedian Mort Sahl during his Aug. 9 performance. A "Fullblown Mermaids" program on Aug. 12 will flavor readings of Beat generation prose and poetry with live jazz. Young performers from OFAM's Jazz Academy will be featured in two free mini-concerts this week and in a full concert Aug. 14. A single concert will be devoted to folk music. "Goodnight Irene: The Folk Revival, 1947-60' on Aug. 10 will feature the High Street Singers, a local group organized for the festival by Jim Dotson of the old bluegrass bluegrass, any species of the large and widely distributed genus Poa, chiefly range and pasture grasses of economic importance in temperate and cool regions. In general, bluegrasses are perennial with fine-leaved foliage that is bluish green in some species. band Kentucky Rose. Along with Dotson on banjo banjo, stringed musical instrument, with a body resembling a tambourine. The banjo consists of a hoop over which a skin membrane is stretched; it has a long, often fretted neck and four to nine strings, which are plucked with a pick or the fingers. and guitar, the group includes David Gross on guitar, David Bersch on bass, Kriss Crowley on guitar and fiddle, and Kathy Burleson on fiddle and mandolin mandolin (măn'dəlĭn`, măn`dəlĭn'), musical instrument of the lute family, with a half-pear-shaped body, a fretted neck, and a variable number of strings, plucked with the fingers or with a plectrum. . They will play and sing songs from a playlist A file that contains an index to a selected group of music files on the computer. Using digital jukebox software such as iTunes and Winamp, playlists are created by the user by dragging and dropping titles from a master index. The software may be able to create a playlist automatically. that includes "Wayfaring way·far·ing n. Traveling, especially on foot. [From Middle English waifaringe, journeying, from Old English wegfarende : weg, way; see way + farende Stranger," "Tom Dooley," "Pack Up Your Sorrows," "Here I Sit on Buttermilk buttermilk residual fluid after removal of fat from milk in butter manufacture; a protein-rich supplement fed to pigs. Hill" and "Walk Right In." Ralph wishes the festival could have served up more slices of the 1950s musical pie. "We couldn't do everything," he says. "We're not as strong on early rock 'n' roll rock 'n' roll: see rock music. and rhythm and blues rhythm and blues (R&B) Any of several closely related musical styles developed by African American artists. The various styles were based on a mingling of European influences with jazz rhythms and tonal inflections, particularly syncopation and the flatted blues chords. as we would have liked to have been, but there is only so much one can do." Although music will obviously predominate, words will be an important part of the festival as well. In addition to Sahl's performance and jazz-backed readings of the poetry of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Kenneth Rexroth, Langston Hughes, Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs, the festival will include a lecture on satirical song writer Tom Lehrer. John Attig's talk on "The Humor of Tom Lehrer" is one of seven free lectures, including two on music, one on "My Fair Lady" and three on other slices of American life in the '50s: the Walt Disney Company, newspaper columnist Herb Caen's San Francisco and "Nuclear Bombs and Nuclear Families." Five free films will provide other ways of viewing American popular culture during the '50s: "High Noon," "On the Waterfront," "Rebel Without a Cause," "Vertigo" and "Some Like It Hot." Sing-alongs were popular during the period, and the festival will include one, a "Golden Oldies Oldies is a generic term commonly used to describe a radio format that usually concentrates on Top 40 music from the '50s, '60s and '70s. Oldies are typically from R&B, pop and rock music genres. " public jam in the Hult Center lobby at 10 a.m. Saturday. An OFAM Elderhostel chorus, an instrumental combo and young performers from OFAM summer camps will take part, and the public will be invited to join in. There'll even be an open microphone segment. Other than that, the music-making will be left to seasoned pros: the "My Fair Lady" orchestra conducted by James Paul and smaller ensembles led by Dick Hyman, a versatile and prolific pianist, organist, arranger and conductor and Emmy Award-winning composer who will take part in almost every concert. Guest musicians this year include vibraphonist Peter Appleyard, Broadway singer Terry Burrell, guitarist Al Caiola, drummer Frank Capp, trumpet player Byron Stripling and ragtime ragtime: see jazz. ragtime U.S. popular music of the late 19th and early 20th centuries distinguished by its heavily syncopated rhythm. Ragtime found its characteristic expression in formally structured piano compositions, the accented left-hand and Tin Pan Alley Tin Pan Alley Genre of U.S. popular music that arose in New York in the late 19th century. The name was coined by the songwriter Monroe Rosenfeld as the byname of the street on which the industry was based—28th Street between Fifth Avenue and Broadway in the early specialist Ian Whitcomb. OREGON FESTIVAL OF AMERICAN MUSIC The Fabulous Fifties What: Musical theater, concerts, recitals, lectures and films Where: John G. Shedd John Graves Shedd (July 20, 1850 - October 22, 1926) was the second president and chairman of the board of Marshall Field & Company. Born on a New Hampshire farm, Shedd arrived in Chicago, Illinois in 1871 and began working as a stock clerk for Marshall Field. Institute for the Arts, Hult Center for the Performing Arts The Hult Center for the Performing Arts is a performing arts facility in Eugene, Oregon, opened in 1982. 27 architectural firms competed for the opportunity to design the Center, but in the end the Eugene City Council awarded the contract to the New York firm of Hardy , Erb Memorial Union and Cuthbert Amphitheatre How much: Prices vary by venue and time of day; see schedule on page B3 Tickets: The Shedd (687-6526) and the Hult Center (682-5000) CAPTION(S): Pianist Dick Hyman will be hard to miss if you attend a few OFAM events. He will play with Dave Brubeck, lead combos of his own and accompany a poetry reading. |
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